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King's College Choir reverberates throughout the Cathedral of St. Paul
December 17, 2004

The bus arrives and the young lads scurry into position for the sound check. (© Eric Melzer)

St. Paul, Minn. — The internationally renowned Choir of King's College, Cambridge, performed its first-ever Christmas concert in Minnesota Monday, December 13, at the Cathedral of St. Paul.

	Cleobury clarifies a note

The choir's unmistakable combination of voices -— men and boys singing without vibrato -— lends a clarity and purity to the music. It's a sound familiar to listeners of the annual broadcasts of A Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols, the choir's hallmark Christmas performance. Through live broadcasts, the Festival rings in the holiday season for listeners around the world.

With 600 years of tradition dating back to King Henry the VI, the choir's mark on the world of music is indelible.

The reverberant space inside the cathedral was the perfect setting for the choir, which performed standards such as "Fantasia on Christmas Carols" by Vaughan Williams and Benjamin Britten's "A Ceremony of Carols," alongside more recent works such as Judith Weir's "Illuminaire, Jerusalem" and John Woolrich's "Spring in Winter."

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